The information network known as the World Wide Web (WWW), which is a subset of the well-known Internet, is arguably the most complete source of publicly accessible information available. Anyone with a suitable Internet appliance such as a personal computer with a standard Internet connection may access (go on-line) and navigate to information pages (termed web pages) stored on Internet-connected servers for the purpose of garnering information and initiating transactions with hosts of such servers and pages.
Many companies offer various subscription services accessible via the Internet. For example, many people now do their banking, stock trading, shopping, and so forth from the comfort of their own homes via Internet access. Typically, a user, through subscription, has access to personalized and secure WEB pages for such functions. By typing in a user name and a password or other personal identification code, a user may obtain information, initiate transactions, buy stock, and accomplish a myriad of other tasks.
One problem that is encountered by an individual who has several or many such subscriptions to Internet-brokered services is that there are invariably many passwords and/or log-in codes to be used. Often a same password or code cannot be used for every service, as the password or code may already be taken by another user. A user may not wish to supply a code unique to the user such as perhaps a social security number because of security issues, including quality of security that may vary from service to service. Additionally, many users at their own volition may choose different passwords for different sites so as to have increased security, which in fact also increases the number of passwords a user may have.
Another issue that can plague a user who has many passworded subscriptions is the fact that they must bookmark many WEB pages in a computer cache so that they may quickly find and access the various services. For example, in order to reserve and pay for airline travel, a user must connect to the Internet, go to his/her book-marks file and select an airline page. The user then has to enter a user name and password, and follow on-screen instructions once the page is delivered. If the user wishes to purchase tickets from the WEB site, and wishes to transfer funds from an on-line banking service, the user must also look for and select the personal bank or account page to initiate a funds transfer for the tickets. Different user names and passwords may be required to access these other pages, and things get quite complicated.
Although this preceding example is merely exemplary, it is generally known that much work related to finding WEB pages, logging in with passwords, and the like is required to successfully do business on the WEB.
A service known to the inventor and described in patent application Ser. No. 09/208,740 entitled “Method and Apparatus for Providing and Maintaining a User-Interactive Portal System Accessible via Internet or other Switched-Packet-Network”, provides a WEB service that allows a user to store all of his password protected pages in one location such that browsing and garnering information from them is much simplified. A feature of the above service allows a user to program certain tasks into the system such that requested tasks are executed by an agent (software) based on user instruction. The service stores user password and log-in information and uses the information to log-in to the user's sites, thus enabling the user to navigate without having to manually input log-in or password codes to gain access to the links.
The above-described service uses a server to present a user-personalized application that may be displayed as an interactive home page that contains all of his listed sites (hyperlinks) for easy navigation. The application lists the user's URL's in the form of hyperlinks such that a user may click on a hyperlink and navigate to the page wherein login, if required, is automatic, and transparent to the user.
The application described above also includes a software agent that may be programmed to perform scheduled tasks for the user including returning specific summaries and updates about user-account pages. A search function is provided and adapted to cooperate with the software agent to search user-entered URL's for specific content if such pages are cached somewhere in their presentable form such as at the portal server, or on the client's machine.
In addition to the features described above, patent application Ser. No. 09/523,598 entitled “Method and Apparatus for Obtaining and Presenting WEB Summaries to Users” describes a software agent used in conjunction with a search function that is enabled to navigate to any URL or group of URL's, provided as input by a user or otherwise deemed appropriate by the service provider, for the purpose of providing summary information regarding updated content for each URL, which may be presented as an HTML information-page to the user.
The above described service uses known site logic for navigating to specific “chunks” of data contained in Web pages at the site. Logic scripts are prepared by knowledge workers operating on behalf of users. With such scripts, gatherer agents may navigate directly to data portions that users are interested in.
Users who subscribe to many on-line services generally do all of their banking, investing, travel arranging, shopping, and so on while on-line with the Internet. Having all of his or her services available at one portal provides a convenience to a user in not having to remember a plurality of passwords, or to be required to physically log-on to each site. Similarly, the ability to obtain summary data associated with selected sites through one interface allows a user to greatly speed any decision making process related to his or her on-line activity. However, summary information may not help a user with certain other concerns. For example, obtaining accurate financial information concerning his entire portfolio of banking and investments would require much user calculation depending on the exact nature of the result desired. Similarly compiling a trend that reflects a user's on-line activity at a plurality of shopping services may also require considerable calculation to be performed by a user. Summary data presented in the above methods is general in nature and reflects such as updates, status of orders, and the like.
An Internet-connected portal system, known to the inventor, has a data repository, a data-gathering system, a request processor, a plurality of report algorithms, and a report processor. The request processor receives a request from a user and matches the request to an individual one of the report algorithms. The data-gathering subsystem accesses plural Internet sites associated with the user and extracts raw data therefrom according to needs of the report algorithm. The report processor processes the raw data according to the report algorithm into meta-summarized information defined by the report algorithm, and the portal system transmits the meta-summarized information as a report to a destination associated with the report request. In some cases there is an aggregated-data database in the data repository storing aggregated data retrieved for specific users periodically, and the request processor checks the aggregated-data database for needed data before requiring the data-gathering system to retrieve data from the associated Internet sites. In the instance that the needed data is stored in the aggregated-data database, the report is prepared from the aggregated data. Reports may be presented in a form such as to include text and graphic formats.
In view of various functional enhancements including the ability to provide calculative and solution-oriented reporting, it has occurred to the inventor that a single interface, through which summary and detailed data may be viewed and manipulated must be provided that is user-friendly, compact and interlinked in terms of request-to-result functionality wherein access and request actions may be performed by working within any category or department of data that may be available to be viewed through the interface. Current and prior-art interactive interface software used with typical data presentation services lacks the flexibility of providing multiple points of intractability within the interface as well as enabling cross-solution implementation across multiple categories of data viewable through the interface.
The above challenges exist with prior-art services in part because they lack much of the interactive capability required in order to enable a fully functional data interface, especially one that interfaces a user with a wide range of disparate data categories.
What is clearly needed is a single, interactive software interface for viewing pluralities of data categories and enabling action requests to be performed from within any one of the multiple data categories. A software interface such as this would greatly convenience users who must interact with a plurality of on-line services in order to effect and propagate on-line business activity related to their financial, employment, travel, recreational, and social activities and engagements.